Snow Day
by Miss Ami-chan
Summary: Set after the end of the series. The girls decided to kick back and go to Tokyo Disneyland for some much needed rest and relaxation, nothing could possibly go wrong with that, right? Right?
1. Chapter 1

_Author's Notes: _

_I hold no rights to PGSM, or any of the wonderful characters who were orginially created by Takeuchi Naoko. This story was written for fun, and to answer the December 2005 pgsm-fanfiction DOT net fic challenge "SNOW" I just realized that it's one of the few stories I have over there that I did not mirror here, so decided to rectify that as it is also being currently worked on, as I endeavor to finish certain plot-bunnies before starting any new ones.  
I also must say a thank you also to: tdrfan DOT com because their wonderful website helped me check I was describing Tokyo Disney correctly._

It's a rare day: Usagi is up early not on a school day, and also cheery about it; but then we are going to a theme park. Disneyland, to be exact.

"Where are they? Where are they?" We're the first ones at CROWN. Our usual meeting spot. Waiting for Makoto, Minako and Mamoru.

Rei is exempt because of shrine obligations, despite Level 3 cajoling from Usagi for several days.

"At least you can make it this time," Usagi declares, apparently having been rambling about Rei while I've been reading, "Maybe I'll call her..."

I'm wondering if I made the right decision to come, myself. At this point Makoto arrives, brushing herself down, apparently trying to restore warmth, "It's getting cold..." she remarks, full body shiver to emphasize, "I saw Mamoru pulling up..."

Usagi barrels up the stairs past her.

"You okay?" she asks.

I nod, "Mmmm..." close my book and put it in my purse.

"It'll be fine. The last time we went to a theme park it was really fun."

"Except for the youma?"

She shrugs, "Off chance that something does show up we're more than capable to kick it's ass," she turns as I come up the steps and we start the short walk to the outside, "besides things have been quiet the past few months since..."

None of us talk about the almost-end-of-the-world. It's an unwritten rule.

Outside, it is getting chilly. The air nips and bites. Usagi has her arms around Mamoru's waist, hands buried in his back pockets. Her nose going slightly pink, "Minako-chan's circling the block," she says, giggling and a cloud of air showing from her mouth, "Come on!"

In a few minutes we're all piling into Minako's car, rubbing chill from our arms, and trying not to fall into the middle of the seats. Minako slides easily over to make room, glances from one to another, to another and tactfully doesn't bring up Rei's absence and set Usagi off again,

"Does anyone else think it looks like snow?" she asks, "S'a bit weird, huh?"

"Oh, I hope it does!" Usagi remarks, leaning into Mamoru as the car turns a corner, "Imagine how romantic the park will look in the snow."

"It's not unheard of for us to get snow..." I point out, trying not to let the worry resurface. Things can be nice. Not every random occurance has to be something sinister, but we do all tend to have these moments of 'it's too quiet', "It just doesn't happen very often."

"Rei is going to be so disappointed she missed out on the trip," Usagi continues, "We'll have to take lots of pictures! I should call her, maybe we can pick her up on the way?"

"She's busy, Usagi-chan," Mamoru clasps his hands over Usagi's to prevent her opening her phone, "Best not to annoy her."

Insert characteristic Usagi pout, "but she's missing out."

"Mamoru-san is right," Minako says, "She's working. It's not polite to bug her. Maybe we can call her around lunch time instead?"

Makoto steps in with distraction, thankfully, by suggesting a travel game, which keeps Usagi in particular busy until we join the line to get into the parking place. Here Minako having VIP access becomes very handy, the roads are extremely busy, and if we'd come by ourselves, well, we would have probably taken the train anyway, so it might have been easier. We slip away to the side away from the main traffic, and find ourselves parking almost immediately, very close to the entry to the park, and we walk our way up.

"I think we should go to Fantasyland first..." Usagi says, "I want to see the castle up close. I wonder if it's like the place on the Moon?"  
"It's made after the Disney film isn't it? Did that remind you?" Makoto asks.

Minako scrapes her hair up into a hat, and puts on glasses. She's dressed slightly away from normal today, wearing a slightly oversize blue tank top with a screen print of Keropi on it, over the top of a pale orange sweater, rather than her normal black and white, and jeans.

"But we can still go there first, right?" she looks pleadingly towards Mamoru.

"It's up to everyone else..." he says, pulling his jacket more tightly around himself.

All of our noses are pink, I can see, and the sky is very grey. As we walk to the ticket line with the passes, we had pre-ordered, we notice other people complaining to each other and bouncing up and down in line trying to keep warm. We've just made it through the entry gate, and are waiting for maps from the vendor on the other side of the booth, when the first flakes start to fall. Slowly at first, drifting like feathers on the wind, and then with more vigor, soon the top of Minako's hat is dusted with sparkling frost, and it catches in our hair and eyebrows, and on our jackets.

"I should have brought those mittens you made me," Usagi complains shaking her fingers around and then clasping her hands to her face to blow on them.

Makoto nods in agreement, shoving her hands into the pockets of her jacket after she has wrestled the zipper closed, "Maybe the first thing we should do is go to a store and get some hot drinks..." she says, "and then we can go to the castle."

We don't take long to agree.

We find a small cafe with no problem. According to the maps there are many littered around the side streets, charging extortionate prices for small portions of familiar drinks with styalized names. We huddle inside, watching the attendants bustling about, one of them, is fiddling, arguing with, and threatening the thermostat.

Another more than willingly serves us steaming mugs of cocoa and coffee, which make our fingers tingle painfully as they restore warmth.

"Can't you do something about this?" Makoto murmurs to me, only half joking, as she passes her cup from hand to hand trying to spare her fingers.

"But you're weather..." I point out, although I know what's coming.

"Thunderstorms, lightening mostly," she reminds.

"You do have water, and snow..." Minako puts in.

"I know, water in it's three states, theoretically," I nod. If anyone knows Boyle's laws, it's me, "but we're incognito...and it's really not fair to use such a thing for personal gain like that..."

Minako giggles, "But all the other patrons would benefit too," she chides, as we go back outside, with what's left of our drinks and try to manage swallowing the hot liquid without scalding ourselves and before it cools in the weather.

The snow is falling very thickly, and the people wandering around look very sluggish and melancholy. I try to think back to the last time I remember there being a snowstorm of this ilk. I was very young, but the people seemed to be enjoying things more in line with Usagi's enthusiasm than these people are...

"If you were smiling and happy you'd be a lot warmer!" Our princess chides a gentleman who is less than thrilled with having to wait two seconds for us to move aside and let him by.

"Maybe it's just Disney," Makoto says, when I mention this to her.

"It's supposed to be the happiest place on earth," Usagi says.

"Maybe just in California," Mamoru answers.

Usagi gives him a look.

He shrugs in response.

"Ami-chan?" Minako asks.

I sigh, "I hate to say it but something does feel 'not right'," I glance around, "I'd like to think I'm being paranoid..."

Minako gets out her compact.

"If we take things systematically we can still make it by the castle," Mamoru remarks, nudging Usagi playfully.

"It would be the best for it's location..." I concur, looking at the map.

"I told Rei-chan she had to come with us!" Usagi points out, "But, no, nobody listens to me. If she was here we'd have everyone to fight this...possible thing..."

"It's not as if we planned on there being a youma attack, and we've fought youma before without all of the senshi," Makoto chides.

Usagi pouts at her, and then at Mamoru when he laughs at her face. We gather into a tight group to try and fight the wind and weather, and then we continue on, to the next section of the park. Hoping against hope that there really isn't anything sinister going on.


	2. Chapter 2

TWO

We walk through what could almost be a maze of side streets, beyond the cafe we just went to, and down. Here it becomes noticeable that things are very wrong, in the 'World Bazaar' area everyone seems to be fine. Happy, sparkling even. The shops and show cases are covered by a protective glass ceiling, and the snow is piling on top thick and heavy, towards the edge of the glass, the snow is blowing in to the streets, and it's almost as though a switch turns the people's mood as soon as they approach.

"Not paranoid," Makoto says, "but what could be doing this?"

Boldly we walk out of the glass. The fairy tale castle is just visible through the hazy sky, but quite a walk away. We have to cross a walkway, surrounded by water features, to get there, but the central point will give us a good vantage to the rest of the park, especially if we can get into the castle itself.

We begin our walk across the sidewalk well enough, but soon the wind is whipping the snow into a frenzy, and our movement has slowed to a crawl. We've barely made it halfway around the circle, when we relent, and peel off down one of the sidestreets, and into a store which seems to be part of 'Adventureland', given Usagi finds herself momentarily scared by a Polynesian style face which is part of the decor.

"I've never seen it like this," the attendant remarks, as we shiver and slap snow of ourselves and each other.

"We may as well draw attention to ourselves..." Minako remarks. She turns to the attendant, "Our map is completely soggy. Do you have a public bathroom nearby?"

We briefly walk outside again, and across to a bathroom. We take our time, waiting until a lady changing her son's diaper has left, and then Makoto closes the door, and holds it while Minako and I call our henshin. It's bitter, the whole air is bitter, it pricks at me until I focus up on my own power inside, and push it out. When I open my eyes again, Jupiter has joined us, Venus and Moon are looking at me with concern.

"This snow...is not right," I manage, "It's poison."

"We need Rei-chan..." Moon repeats.

I nod, "Fire against Ice. There's a good possibility anything I try to do to whatever is causing this, is just going to make it stronger."

It doesn't take long for Rei to answer the phone, "I've been sneezing all morning guys!" she chides, first off and then, "What's going on? For the past hour I've felt like I'm freezing, but things are fine up here."

"It's snowing," Moon says.

"Snowing?" Rei repeats, "I take it it's not some kind of Disney theme event."

"No," Venus says, "We could really use you here..."

There is a sound from outside which sounds like someone hastily wrapping a walking stick against the door, "Girls, I really think you need to get out here!" Mamoru's voice sounds strained.

"That's only going to happen if you know how to teleport..." Rei points out.

"Henshin and call us back," Venus says.

"We know how to teleport?" Moon asks, sounding as though she's not even quite sure what the word means.

"I did manage to hold open the portal to get you, Mars, and all the girls away from that youma," I point out, "and we, four, less Venus got you and I out of the Dark Kingdom realm after I..." I trail off, "So, in theory we could at least open a portal for Mars to come through."  
Moon's phone chimes.

"Okay. I'm ready." Mars says, once the phone is answered. She hangs up as instructed a moment later, and Venus pulls out a small compact and opens it. Through it we can see Mars, standing in the center of one of the rooms at the Hikawa Shrine. She has her hands clasped together in focused concentration. The four of us together join our hands in a circle, as we watch her in the mirror, her aura sparks into visible light, fiery and resplendent, like a phoenix.

In turn each of us closes our eyes, hands gripped tightly power surging towards the middle of the circle. Suddenly I feel the pull, and instinctively withdraw my hands from the circle and move them instead towards the circle center. Weight drops onto my arms and the arms of the others, as I open my eyes, and find we're holding Mars above the ground.

We step to one side still holding her. Venus lets go first, so that she can retrieve her compact, which has dulled again, and the rest of us lower Mars to her feet.

She brushes herself off, "I think I'd prefer the train in the future," she says.

The rapping of Kamen's cane comes again, and we rush to the door. Mars opens it first and we see what's going on. At first the sight is  
confusing, it looks as though snow banks are moving, but then as our eyes become focused once more on looking through the snowy haze, I realize it's the people, the patrons and workers of the park. The snow has crusted to them, and they're moving in packs, chasing down others who are not as covered and dragging them out into the snow. "We can't go after them they're people..." Moon murmurs.

"You could try healing them," Jupiter suggests.

"But it might be futile..." Mars counters, "Unless we find what's causing this. Mercury, work with me?"

"Hm?" I ask.

"Snow is more your tune, if I channel energy through you the two of us should be able to narrow down where this is coming from."

I'm not sure how to do what she suggests, so I look at her a bit blankly.

She laughs, "Trust me it's okay. Really all you have to do is focus on the worst nastiest feeling snow, and I'll hold your hand like this and focus on the strongest power," she pauses, "strongest evil power, no point blinding myself with Moon here."

"We can keep the others at bay," Venus says, "Carefully," she adds looking at Jupiter.

"They're people I know," Jupiter jokes, "No kicking them unless they kick first."

I always have that moment of not feeling confident at all about this sort of thing, and chew on my lip a little before Mars takes my hand and waggles it, "You'll be fine," she says with a smile, "Trust yourself. You tracked Usagi-chan across Tokyo this thing should be a breeze."

"Thank you," I say, softly, and take a deep breath before closing my eyes. For a moment the feeling of crawling bugs is overwhelming. I briefly slip back mentally to the time of Dark Mercury and almost panic, but pull things together. I breath in again, push past the compulsion to start slapping at myself to get the snow away from me, and breath out, breathe in. Yes. The snow is nasty, it's evil, but some of it is worse, where's the worst?

I feel Mars beside me. I can almost hear her, saying the same thing, where's the worst? Where's the worst?

I feel myself being pulled, as though someone has a hold of the bow on the back of my fuku and is dragging me, up and up into the air, and I'm hanging.

If I opened my eyes where would I be?

The tallest ride in Adventureland.

I open my eyes. I'm standing next to Mars, surrounded by the other senshi and Tuxedo Kamen who are fending back the yeti-patrons.

"Adventureland," Mars says.

I nod. Well, at least if we're both wrong, we're both wrong together.

"You have something?" Jupiter asks, sounding hopeful.

"Which way?" Mars asks.

I turn around in a circle for a moment, gauging, the castle is over there, Tomorrowland is over there, "Over this way…" we take the tops of the buildings, to avoid the snow men. They streak towards us anyway, trying to climb. In some areas the snow is drifting so high against the buildings they can walk up to meet us, and we have to fight them off.

This is the hardest part. In many cases you can still see the people beneath the snow, and you don't want to hurt them, but they do not show us the same courtesy. We almost lose Moon at one point, because several of them grab her and try to drag her from the roof top into them and casual punching of arms does no good even when Jupiter does it. In the end Venus whips them with her wink-chain enough for Moon to get an arm free enough to zap them with her own power, partially healed and confused they release her and Kamen is able to pull her back up.

We take pre-emptive from that point, zapping around us as we run in the hopes they won't climb up after us.

We're almost at our destination and trying to look around for signs of the person or creature who is causing this, but the air is so much thicker with snow that it's almost impossible to see. We hesitate at the last rooftop, wondering if we should take the plunge, when the blizzard reaches out and grabs us.


	3. Chapter 3

THREE

I open my eyes. I'm on...floor? It's very cold, sickening cold. Ice. I look around. Icy cave. This can't be Dark Kingdom again, but it feels almost that way.

I curl myself up and then make myself sit and look around. Where are the others? I can't see anyone. I can barely see the walls of this place. I try the communicator on my wrist, what the phone turns into once we henshin so we don't have to carry it. Nothing but static as I expected. Well, the only thing for it is to keep walking, stick to the right side wall and hopefully I'll find something.

Before I start walking. I use some of my power to pull the ice up onto a sort of statue, something which forms a kind of arrow and has a crude Mercury symbol on the top. If someone else comes by, one of the senshi or Tuxedo Kamen, perhaps they'll realize what it meant and follow me.

I walk slowly, in case someone else does come. Listening like a hawk and also trying to sense, but all this evil snow/ice is screwing up my sense of it. We must really be in the midst of the worst of the evil snow, as Mars was talking...so, there's really not much I can do to use that sense to track anything down. I try to remember what I did, when Kunzite had been trying to possess Usagi-chan, to see if I can repeat that and track her down instead, but all I can find is a wall of buzzing evil, like hundreds of snowy flies are in my ears and eyes, so I stop, and just keep walking forward.

It's cold, even to me. To keep my mind off I start doing sums in my head. 88 is 16, 16+16 is 32 and so on. I'm up to 274877906944 when I reach a split in the passage, and I still haven't found anyone else. I can hear something though. The passage seems to have been moving up or at least back towards the park, because I can hear the sound of motors, and cars going very unsteadily across rails, buffetted. Cars being hit by large blocks of ice and snow, perhaps...I run towards that sound, the math forgotten and the cold as well, with the adrenaline surge.

I can see hazy daylight at the end of one of the passages when I hear someone shout and turn back. Jupiter is limping towards me, having come the other way up the passage it appears. She has a gash on her left leg, and I stop so that she can catch up with me.

"You didn't see anyone else?" she asks.

I shake my head, "None of the others, no more of the snow...zombie park patrons either.

Together we walk out into the hazy light. The area we emerge into is not as full of snow, most of the snow seems to be concentrated on one side, as if being blown by a strong wind. The noise I heard was one of Adventureland's roller coasters, which is on automatic, and still going around the track, every so many minutes, even though there is noone on it.

As we come out into the daylight, Venus, Moon and Kamen appear out of other passageways. All of us look at each other making a mental count. Mars is missing. We look around.

Moon spots her and points. There's a glass bubble, it reminds me of a snow globe, and she's inside. Frozen, unconcious, held splayed almost like a figure of Jesus on a crucifix, and it's filling with something, icy water, perhaps. Whatever it is the fluid is up to her knees, and moving quickly towards her head.

Venus throws out her chain but something around the bubble deflects it away before it makes contact. Jupiter is powering up to try a thunderbolt at it, and Venus is gearing up for a second blow, when a bright light fills the area in front of us, and we all take pause. The light coalesces into a humanoid shape, slim, female, made of ice. She has perfect round breasts, no nipples, like a glass statue, except she moves. For a moment as she forms, her face is equally smooth, except for spiked hair forming behind her head, from about where ears would be if she had any, and then on out, like one of those sun carvings in one of the other park areas.

Then as the last of the light disappears from inside her body structure, eyes roll open in her head, and a crack appears below in her chin area that opens into a mouth. When she laughs it sounds like glass breaking.

"That stays where is," she says, in fractured Japanese pointing to Mars in the bubble, "No freedom. You," she points towards us, as we stand dumbfounded, "why you not fall to Kaguya as others did?"

"Why are you doing this?" Moon demands, ignoring the question, "Why are you hurting all of these people? What did they ever do to you?"

She either doesn't care or doesn't understand, "No matter. You oppose this. Die!" and a blast of negative ice energy issues from both her hands as she sweeps them and from her body and back.

I'm tempted to think she's screwed up, because I don't feel anything hit me, but then I realize the energy wasn't meant to hit us. In front of us has formed a good battallion of creatures which are almost like her, slightly trimmer, slightly smaller, more our size, and all laughing, as they start to spin, their icy hands forming into cruel talons as they launch themselves at us.


	4. Chapter 4

FOUR

"It's going to have to be a team effort or not at all," Venus says, before I can voice my fear that I will be counter productive she adds, "I don't know if any of you will remember this or not, but we can channel our power through Moon. We feed her with our energy and she channels it out towards the enemy."

The fighting is rough, for a while it seems as though no sooner we destroy one then it forms into several others which take it's place and make things all the more difficult. It takes a lot of tag-teaming, especially on my part given I'm more than a little paranoid of making them stronger by shooting more ice at them. Then it clicks. Several are gearing up to attack Jupiter, and instead of shooting my energy at them I put it between her and them, they slam into it, and are held at bay long enough for her to sneak to one side and annilate them with a well placed electric charge.

So that becomes our plan of attack, we can use the ice barriers to herd them into one spot, and then team attack those that are left and weren't destroyed previous to this.

Kaguya is, of course, displeased, but it's not as if we were doing this to make her happy. She shoots several energy bolts at us, exploding the barriers and the remaining fragments of ice that are around. Even I'm starting to feel the cold at this point, and I can see the redness on everyone else's arms and legs from the exposure. Not a one of us doesn't have a pink nose.

"I'm never going to be warm again," Moon says, but manages to only sound slightly whiny.

"Somehow I don't think she's going to let herself be herded," I say.

"But we need to do something. We can't just sit here!" Jupiter bangs one fisted hand into her palm, and then winces and rubs her fingers, "if our limbs don't start dropping off."

"They're the wrong color for frostbite," I point out, "The discoloration would-"

"I don't want to know!" she cuts in, and looks around.

Venus has been looking around just as much as I have. We have to get Mars out and quickly. My body seems to take it upon itself to cleanse out the taint before recycling which makes things a bit harder. It's easier to make something dirty than it is to clean it out.

"If we pool together. It might be enough..." she suggests, "At least to make the cage brittle, and then perhaps a well placed blow?" she looks at Kamen. He nods.

We quickly assemble around Moon, behind the barrier each with one hand on Moon's shoulders, and start to focus, as Kamen picks his way around the area towards Mars.

We channel everything into our collective weapons. I focus on piercing, and changing from solid to liquid, afraid otherwise I might inadvertantly strenghten the barrier. Our efforts are working though I can see cracks starting to form. Kamen leaps up and hits the casing with the butt of his cane, and that does it. I can hear Kaguya shrieking and see Mars falling surrounded by a cloud of water converting to steam. She drops and rolls. I want to reach out. Kaguya is angered.

Every step is great effort for a few moments. I feel leaden and completely drained and we still have Kaguya to fight. Hopefully her own energy is getting depleted, but you wouldn't known it to look at her, we run as quickly as we can for some other sort of cover, with Kaguya following, and the occasional sprite showing up.

"Can we do that again?" Moon asks, "Would it work against her?"

Venus shrugs. I don't konw either. None of us does. She's completely alien, "She's nothing we've ever fought before in any life," Venus confesses, "I'm sort of making things up as we go..."

"Perhaps if we pool our energies together but..." I hesitate. I'm still nervous, as alien as she is that doesn't change the fact I don't want to strengthen her, but this seems to have triggered something in Venus, some sort of realization.

"If we channel our energy into Moon!" she says, "It will all convert to her type. That we have done before...just not...well, you get the point. Quickly!"

Each of us grabs hold of Moon wherever possible, and we focus again. Moon lets out one short exclamation about how tingly it feels, and then focusses all her might on her wand and channeling the energy. We can hear Kaguya's power pounding away the barrier I erected, as the wand tip faintly begins to glow and then the energy builds up until it's just this huge white ball all around us. I feel energized despite the drain. Kaguya's attacks are pounding on the globe around us. I feel as though I'm holding my breath, and embraced in a cone of complete nothingness, I'm only aware of the five of us and Moon, until I can't hold the breath any longer and we fall forwards with the release of the charge. I can see the others falling to the ground around me, and we seem to hit with a collective thud. Only Moon is still standing gripping so tightly to the wand I would imagine her knuckles are going white. Vaguely through the strain of trying to hold my eyes open I can make out Kaguya completely bathed in this light and held erect hovering above the ground her back arched. My scientific brain is sluggishly reminding me that light should melt ice, but Kaguya seems to be fracturing. Then everything else goes dark to me and I don't know what's going on.

"Ami-chan!" the hand is warm on my chilled body as I tilt my head and cautiously open my eyes, "Quick we have to move!" Usagi is standing over me with Makoto and Mamoru moving passed her. I can hear them waking Minako and Rei, "Quickly! Quickly!" she says, pulling me to my feet, "We must appear like everyone else..."

"It's over?"

Usagi nods, "She turned into this strange white light person and shot off into the sky!"

We huddle together, trying to look confused and headache-ridden and sore like the others who were taken over by Kaguya. It's not too much of a stretch. I'm so drained, and the others aren't much better. Usagi while slightly more energetic than the rest of us, also looks as though she could do with a nap. She keeps snuggled against Mamoru, as we walk into the main area of the park. There's some sort of announcement coming over the speaker system that we have been asked to leave the park for our own safety. I don't catch the rest of it, but it's welcome to go home.

I just want to sleep.


End file.
